Securitising the Pandemic: A Kenyan Experience

Brian Kimari

The Covid-19 pandemic has brought to the fore a wide range of security challenges and vulnerabilities. A prominent involvement of the security sector in response to the COVID-19 crisis has further compounded the issue, particularly in communities with historically troublesome relations between residents and the state. Kenya has had an overly securitised response to the pandemic, prioritising various security and criminal justice measures over public health objectives. This securitisation was met with high levels of police violence in the enforcement of the range of curfew orders, movement restrictions, and social distancing measures put in place by the government. By June 2020, the Independent Policing Oversight Authority (IPOA), the body responsible for police oversight, had received 87 complaints of police brutality during curfew enforcement, including 15 deaths and 31 serious injuries.

The Kenyan government has casted it’s COVID-19 as a security problem, necessitating police and other security agencies to enforce exceptional measures as part of its response. The government issued curfew and movement restriction orders under the Public Order Act rather than the Public Health Act, which is the applicable law for public health emergencies. Adopted in 1956 under the British colonial government, the former has the effect of granting police discretion and sweeping powers to enforce orders against ‘breach of peace’, an ambiguous common law concept that discloses offences such as being idle and disorderly, and offences conducive to breach of peace. Further, the Public Order (State Curfew) Order 2020 only permits exemptions when issued in writing by a police officer in charge of a county or a police officer in-charge of a police division. This process, of limiting this authority to the police, defies the logics of pandemic response and makes it seem as if the order was imposed to fight crime and disorder, rather than serve a public health purpose. The approach to the pandemic in Kenya has thus been largely securitized.

This securitization has also been shaped by the nature of political rhetoric. Official pronouncements from the president, the health ministry officials, and security agencies simultaneously emphasised the seriousness of government COVID-19 measures and levelled threats against those found in breach. For instance, when Health Cabinet Secretary (CS) Mutahi Kagwe addressed Kenyans about the consequences of breaking curfew rules, he warned: “Once you are out during curfew hours, it is assumed that you have been exposed to the disease.” This rhetoric consistently characterises citizens as undisciplined and inclined to breaking the law, all of which will be met with strict police action to ensure compliance.

Strict police action soon became evident, with numerous reports of police violence in enforcing the COVID-19 measures swiftly emerging. These reports documented numerous cases of police brutality and assault, in some incidences involving the use of lethal weapons. This includes the shooting of Yasiin Moyo, a 13-year-old boy, while he stood on his balcony in Kiamaiko area, Mathare only 20 minutes after the curfew had begun. Some of police actions also ran counter to health guidelines for managing the pandemic i.e. holding curfew breakers without adhering to social distancing guidelines and lobbing teargas canisters, the irritation from which would cause people to touch their faces. The police were also accused of denying bail at the police station and instead extracting bribes with threat of detention in quarantine facilities.

While reports of police violence in enforcement of the pandemic reduced following the president’s public apology on 1st April 2020, there remain numerous accounts of police violence. This is especially the case for low-income urban neighbourhoods, where the heavy-handedness nature of policing has not only been in the enforcement of COVID-19 measures, but also in regular crime response and in the management of public gatherings and demonstrations. During a demonstration held against government corruption in management of COVID-19, police officers ruthlessly beat, lobbed, teargas, and arrested protesters.

Furthermore, state police officers were also involved in forced demolitions and evictions of over 5,000 people in Kariobangi and 1,500 in Ruai, both in Nairobi, leaving many families homeless as they face the COVID-19 pandemic. Residents of informal settlements live under constant threat of eviction considering that majority live on public land and have been arbitrarily deprived of the land without compensation and often despite court orders in their favour. In the current state of affairs, residents are increasingly vulnerable to police violence. The killing of Vaite, a homeless man, by police officers for non-adherence to the curfew orders is a testament to that. The violent response has exacerbated social tensions and grievances where police are seen as illegitimate agents of the state and powerful private actors.

The prioritisation of security and criminal justice measures has run counter to public health objectives and exacerbated health disparities that may frustrate the overall management of COVID-19. Against the advice of the National Council on Administration of Justice (NCAJ) to scale down arrests and decongest detention facilities, police officers enforced numerous arrests and detentions for violation of curfew orders. Initially, the National Emergency Response Committee, chaired by the Health CS, had issued punitive orders that police hold curfew breakers in quarantine centres regardless of their COVID-19 status. They later directed the Inspector General of Police to designate a ‘curfew breakers holding place’. Both of these constitute human rights violations, especially in the context of scaled-down court activities as a result of the pandemic.

This over-reliance on criminal justice measures in managing the pandemic has also proven detrimental to the police. Police officers are, due to the nature of their work, much more vulnerable to COVID-19 and many officers and their families have been quarantined. The police have complained that they lack the capacity to handle COVID-19 infected persons, thereby forcing them to improvise separate cells at police stations in order to prevent the spread of the disease. Nairobi regional police commander argued that there is a disconnect between the Kenya Prison Service, the Judiciary, and the Ministry of Health in the handling of COVID-19 suspects in police custody. He stated: “The MoH has maintained that its facilities are full, hence cannot accommodate suspects in police custody who have tested positive of coronavirus. Prisons have also restricted admission of suspects after their arraignment & insist they will only admit suspects after they are returned to police custody and confirmed to be negative of the virus. The courts, being left with no options continue to direct the suspects for remand in police stations.” Residents of low-income neighbourhoods are disproportionately affected by these challenges within the justice system due to increased interactions with law enforcement.

For many residents of these low-income neighbourhoods, much of this is, tragically, not entirely new. Police violence, intimidation, and extortion are a part of their everyday realities and social justice centres have documented this for several years. Covid-19 or not, the police are still perceived as a force to be feared. What perhaps is different to the contemporary repressive conduct of the state police is the direct impact on public health objectives. The pandemic seems to have given certain police officers added justification to use excessive force. And if securitisation does not stop, we will only witness the escalation of tensions, further exacerbating the cyclical patterns of violence that define most of Nairobi’s low-income neighbourhoods.